


Crescent For Good Luck

by Laiska



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Conversations, Family, Gen, Love, Mother-Daughter Relationship, Platonic Relationships, Social Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-23
Updated: 2017-02-23
Packaged: 2018-09-26 10:37:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,329
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9890684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Laiska/pseuds/Laiska
Summary: Fareeha knew that tone. It was the cadence of the start of a story, the wonders of which she could never grow out of the joy of hearing.Alternatively, a mother and daughter discuss the good old days, some of which weren't always so good. But the world is getting better.





	

"You know, Fareeha."

Her ears pricked over the sound of metal clinking on porcelain. The little spoon, swimming in its own vortex of shredded petals and leaves, slowed then stopped, standing still like a dock post. The eddies spun around it.

Fareeha knew that tone. It was the cadence of the start of a story; or sometimes a lecture, if she was unlucky, though there were subtle differences in the edge of how her mother called her name in reprimand. Both of these scenarios were quick to catch her attention. Even now, as an adult, causing her mother disappointment was the most painful thing she could think of, all the more painful now that she had known loss, and that each new moment with her seemed a fragile, transient jewel.

Ah, but when it was a _story_... The joy of hearing those was something else that she could not outgrow. The tales her mother told her were of battle and glory, of adventure, of love. Some of the stories were true, and some were fantasy; some she had even been alive for, if not present. But she listened closely and hung on every word, her eyes half-shut to savor the conjured visions and file them away inside of her. She always interpreted the morals wrong, Ana would tell her, when afterward they reviewed the things she had heard. It always earned her a judging squint and heavy sigh, but those reactions never bothered her. It just meant, Fareeha would say, that she had to tell it again later, because _surely_ she would get it next time.

So, at these words, her back straightened and her cheeks tingled, and she stumbled to swiftly ferry the tray with its two small cups to the table, where she set it down between them.

"Yes, Mum?" she asked, as she pulled out her seat and settled onto it.

The older woman was sitting askew to the table, swiping through articles on a holographic screen. Smelling the tea, she collapsed the reader and turned to take her cup. She held the gilded lip to her mouth, and inhaled. She breathed out softly to cool it.

Finally, she spoke again.

"The world was a very different place when I was born."

Fareeha nodded and sipped her own tea, as quietly as she could.

"You've said so before," she replied. "But, what do you mean?"

Ana took her time, still not drinking but enjoying the lazy vapours that rose from the heated surface. Fareeha watched her healthy eye appear to flicker beyond the mirage.

"Perhaps you wouldn't know it now... Even when you were a girl things were better for us, and because of who I was, you were always safe."

Fareeha's brow crinkled. This did not seem like much of a story.

"Do you mean the Omnics?" she asked. "I can't imagine what life would've been like before them."

Ana shook her head.

"Well, no. I mean, yes, that most certainly is a big difference. If the computers back then had been walking and speaking to you, you would have been very shocked, or at least very impressed. But, I don't mean the Omnics. I'm talking about people."

Finally, she took a sip of her tea. From the look on her face she seemed to approve of the flavour.

"Machines and robots," she continued, "They are their own problem. The greatest danger that humans have ever faced, however? That is other humans. We are, and always have been, our own downfall, and that was long before the Omnics ever existed.

"Clearly, I don't remember the world in the year that I was born, but I've heard much from my mother, and her mother, and I know how things were once I grew old enough to perceive on my own. And what I know is that, the world has not always been kind, for people like us."

"People like us?" Fareeha repeated, concerned. "You mean…"

Ana smiled.

"Women."

"Oh."

Fareeha shrank back in her chair.

"If there is one group that has always had a hard time," said Ana. "It is women. There are so many things that are expected of us, and so little given back. These days, sometimes, it seems as though everyone is rather equal, and perhaps that has to do with us all finding a common enemy, I don't know. But, I am glad that it has changed, and that you didn't have to deal with so much of that."

Fareeha frowned. It wasn't as though she hadn't had to deal with it—with assumptions being made of her just because she had the chance fortune to be born a daughter. Thankfully, she was so physically and professionally imposing that most people would never dare to show her disrespect, not when she could knock them unconscious with a blow or make their careers a living hell. It was true that she didn't know the world of her mother's childhood, but at least she could imagine. She sipped her tea.

The table shifted as the older woman crossed her legs beneath it, elbows resting on the surface. Her gaze was shifted downward, an uncharacteristic weariness on her hardened face.

"Do you know, when I first joined the Armed Forces, it was not even a whole ten years since they allowed us to enter the service? In some places, women have been serving for a long time, but Egypt took its time joining them. It was a big controversy."

"But then, people got over it, didn't they?"

"Ha. Eventually. Once they realized that we could shoot as well as they did, and wouldn't be distracted by our own bodies being around, they took us a bit more seriously. Still, it certainly did not happen overnight."

Fareeha finished her cup, then stared down into the scraping of leaves that remained at the base, trying to divine a pattern in them, an answer. Ana pulled up her newsreader again. Finding no reply in the depths of the cup, the daughter spoke.

"Can I ask why you brought this up?"

"It's nothing," Ana said. "I'm probably just talking to myself. You can ignore this old woman's ramblings."

"You're not that old, Mum."

Her single eye crinkled.

"Old enough. Anyway, I was just thinking how happy I am to see the world moving forward. I suppose maybe all that it took was destroying the whole place to make us see how petty we were. My only hope is that we don't start to forget."

"People won't forget. I won't let them."

"I know you won't, _habibti_."

She set her cup down with a clink, and prodded at the screen.

"You know, someday, I will have to retire."

Fareeha laughed. "I don't think you'll ever retire."

"It will happen someday. Even I get tired sometimes."

"But you've risen from the _dead_ ," Fareeha teased. "You can do anything."

"Yes, _habibti_ , I'm your zombie mother. But I imagine even the undead must have to rest now and then. Anyway, the time _will_ come, and perhaps even sooner than you think."

The joy fell from Fareeha's voice.

"But you aren't…"

"I don't deny my age, Fareeha. And I won't. It is as much a part of who I am as this eye of mine. To deny yourself is to deny the truth, and that is foolishness. No, someday I will have to take my seat and leave this world to the rest, and it won't be my place anymore."

She sighed, and her eye drifted back to the screen, iris glinting with the reflected light.

"But, at least…"

Her gaze flicked from the reader, which displayed a photo of a bright young girl from Numbani, back to her daughter, who sat in her view, tall and strong and more perfect than she could have ever dreamed. The woman smiled.

"I know that I will be leaving it in good hands."

Fareeha smiled back, and rose to make them another pot of tea.

**Author's Note:**

> Perfect or no, I feel a lot of things about the ladies of Overwatch.
> 
> The world isn't always a great place now, but maybe we can make it better tomorrow.


End file.
